“Over time you get educated,” said Yankees general manager Brian Cashman. “You want to all be macho and say, ‘American League East at all cost,’ but hey man, I’ve been part of the Yankees now for a long time. I’ve been beaten by a wild-card Red Sox team in ’04. I’ve been beaten by a wild-card Florida Marlins in the World Series in ’03. I’m not saying give me the wild card. I’m just saying we’ve got to realize perspective. We’re in this to try to win a World Series. If we don’t, people remember that we didn’t more than whatever we did.

“This is about trying to line us up and getting our guys in a position to play at full gear if we can get ourselves to October. We’ve got to get there, but I don’t think the conditions of Swish and Gardner during the Tampa series, I don’t think they would have helped us regardless. But I think we’re in a better position now because we backed off and didn’t try to push them through.”

Brian Cashman is absolutely right, the only thing that matters is winning the World Series. If the Yankees aren’t at 100 percent by October their chances take a big hit. If that means they have to get to the playoffs via the Wild-Card to be healthy, so be it. If the Yankees win the Series again in 2010, nobody will care if they were only the Wild-Card.

About Rob Abruzzese

Rob Abruzzese created Bronx Baseball Daily in 2008 just before graduating from Brooklyn College. He currently serves BBD as its editor and works as a reporter at the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. Follow Rob on Twitter @RobAbruzzese.